The objective of this common narrative is to facilitate consistent messaging among IASC members during upcoming climate events in 2021. To this end, the common narrative has served as basis for the video submitted by 12 IASC organizations to the Climate Adaptation Summit as a prerecorded side event, which was shared widely via social media by the humanitarian and wider climate community in early 2021.
The IASC duty of care minimum standards guide IASC members and standing invitees (hereinafter ‘the IASC organizations’') in the implementation of adequate duty of care provisions in the context of COVID-19 for all of their personnel regardless of nationality and contractual type.
These messages address the climate change related concerns in the context of humanitarian action and COVID-19. The objective of these key messages is to facilitate consistent messaging among IASC members during upcoming climate change events in 2020. This includes the announcement of the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and the UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson to co-host an event convening global leaders on 12 December 2020 to rally greater climate action and ambition.
The COVID-19 pandemic is exacerbating protection concerns in humanitarian crises and exposing vulnerable populations to new threats. Protection clusters are reporting an increase in cases of violence, including a ‘shadow pandemic’ of Gender Based violence (GBV), forced displacement, a rise in xenophobia and stigmatization, alongside discrimination in access to health, food, water, education and legal services for vulnerable and marginalized groups.